F 

E3P5 


ANNUAL  ADDRESS. 


BY  HORACE  G:  PLATT     ,%€<.-. M<>. 


BEFORE  THE 


NEVADA  STATE  UNIVERSITY, 
RENO,  NEVADA,  JUNE  2nd,  1898 


Baoa 


PUBLISHED   BY 

NEVADA  STATE  UNIVERSITY 
RENO,  NEVADA 


Bancroft  Ubiao 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

Microsoft  Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/annualaddressbefOOplatrich 


Mr,  President,  Gentlemen  of  the  Faculty,   Young 

Ladies   and  Gentlemen   of   the    Graduating 

Class  :— 

I  know  of  no  more  responsible  task,  nor  one  that 
should  receive  more  serious  attention,  than  that  of  address- 
ing a  class  of  graduates,  young  men  and  women  who  have 
reached  the  parting  of  the  roads  where  the  traveler  must 
make  the  correct  choice  or  go  astray ;  who  have  before  them 
their  first  real  problem,  whose  correct  solution  must  deter- 
mine their  lot  in  life  ;  who  have  reached  the  end  of  play- 
time, whose  aftermath  is  work  which  must  result  ill  or  well 
as  it  is  wisely  or  unwisely  performed ;  who  must  no  longer 
make  mistakes ;  who  must  now  make  their  choice,  knowing 
that  ' '  whoever  chooses  must  choose  aright.  Wrong  choice 
carries  it  own  destruction" ;  and  who  must  be  told  that 
"earth  bears  no  balsam  for  mistakes."  Bearing  all  this  in 
mind,  I  would  like  to  develop  these  thoughts  along  a  line 
personal  to  yourselves.  But  there  is  today  one  question 
that  above  all  others  demands  consideration,  and  therefore 
I  have  determined  to  talk  to  you  upon  the  moment- 
ous problem  that  recently  confronted  this  nation,  and  to 
endeavor  to  help  you  to  the  conclusion,  if  you  have  not 
already  reached  it,  that  the  President  and  Congress  have 
attempted  the  only  solution  that  was  possible  under  the  cir- 
cumstances, and  that  would  leave  us  still  worthy  of  the 


[4] 

sacred  trust  of  protection  to  the  weak  which  God  has 
always  imposed  upon  the  strong. 

I  feel  that  I  can  in  no  other  way  so  forcibly  impress 
upon  you  the  grave  importance  of  right  judgment  and  the 
fatality  of  wrong  judgment,  the  necessity  of  honestly,  fear- 
lessly, and  wisely  solving  the  great  problems  of  life,  and 
the  disasters  that  follow  their  wrong  solution. 

I  would  have  you  now  and  always  seek  first  to  find 
reasons  for  believing  your  country  to  be  in  the  right,  rather 
than  to  hasten  (  as  do  too  many  )  to  prove  that  she  is  in  the 
wrong :  I  would  have  your  first  impulse  patriotic  rather 
than  critical.  While  every  true  American  is  for  his 
country,  right  or  wrong,  yet  how  much  more  strenuously 
is  he  her  supporter,  if  he  believes  that  she  is  in  the  right ! 
A  Nation,  like  an  individual,  must  choose  aright. 

When  the  news  of  the  Maine  disaster  shocked  the 
Nation  and  electrified  seventy  millions  of  freemen,  and 
Congress,  the  South  joining  hands  with  the  North,  by 
unanimous  vote,  appropriated  fifty  millions  to  the  country's 
needs;  when  the  President's  call  for  volunteers  was  re- 
sponded to  instantly  alike  in  New  Orleans  and  in  Boston, 
and  the  Rebel  yell  mingled  in  patriotic  chorus  with  the 
Federal  cheer  ;  when  the  grand-son  of  Grant  enlisted  upon 
the  staff  of  the  nephew  of  Robert  E.  Lee,  and  the  Gray 
and  the  Blue  blended  into  the  Red,  White  and  Blue  ;  when 
Baltimore  welcomed  with  Southern  hospitality  the  cele- 
brated Sixth  Massachusetts  Regiment  which  in  1861  it  had 
mobbed  with  Southern  hate,  giving  it  flowers  and  cheers  in 
place  of  stones  and  jeers,  hugs  and  kisses  in  place  of  kicks 
and  hisses,  and  upon  Baltimore's  banner  was  engraved 
"For  our  country  and  humanity:     Baltimore  and  Boston 


[5] 

clasp  hands.  May  the  memory  of  1861  be  effaced  by  the 
welcome  of  1898";  when  the  South  consecrated  its  alleg- 
iance to  our  one  flag  with  the  death  of  one  of  her  sons, 
Ensign  Bagley,  the  war's  first  victim,  and  with  his  blood 
sealed  the  reunion  of  the  States,  I  felt  that  only  a  great  and 
just  cause  was  worthy  of  such  manifestation  of  the  absolute 
and  eternal  oneness  and  indissolubility  of  our  Union,  and 
that  the  war  was  not  a  mistake,  and  was  worth  all  its  cost. 
When  the  Sailor  Meek  uttered,  as  he  died  aboard  the  ill- 
fated  Winslow,  "Tell  them  I  died  like  a  man,"  I  felt  that 
such  a  man  should  not  be  sacrificed  but  in  a  holy  and  just 
war,  and  I  believe  that  the  cause  for  which  he  died  is 
worthy  of  the  sacrifice.  I  hope  that  you  will  in  your  cool 
judgment  as  well  as  in  your  glowing  patriotism  fully  agree 
with  me. 

Hundreds  of  years  ago  there  journeyed  from  palace  to 
court,  from  court  to  church,  from  the  throne  to  the  altar, 
and  from  priest  to  king  a  navigator  who  believed  that  the 
world  was  much  larger  than  Roman  Emperor  or  Vandal 
Chief  or  Spanish  Monarch  had  ever  dreamed,  and  that 
there  were  undiscovered  lands  rich  in  silver  and  gold  that 
had  never  paid  tribute  to  Rome,  Constantinople  or  Madrid. 
This  man  was  Columbus,  and  in  Spanish  ships  he  crossed 
the  trackless  seas,  and  revealed  this  continent  to  an  aston- 
ished world.  Such  veneration  have  we  always  shown  for 
the  name  of  this  navigator,  that  in  1893  we  gave  his  name 
to  that  White  City  by  the  I,ake  where  all  the  children  of 
the  sons  of  men,  from  Greenland's  icy  mountains  to  Afric's 
burning  sands,  and  from  the  wave- washed  islands  of  many 
seas,  gathered  in  friendly  competition  much  that  was  best 
and  most  beautiful  and  useful  in  art  and  science  and  skill 


[6] 

and  trade  and  agriculture  and  manufacture,  and  we  entitled 
it  the  Columbian  Exposition,  and  to  it  not  only  were  there 
sent  from  Spain  truthful  reproductions  of  those  famous 
ships  that  brought  Columbus  to  these  shores,  but  also  there 
came  as  the  honored  guests  of  this  government  royal  rep- 
resentatives of  that  government  that  started  Columbus  on 
his  inspired  voyage.  And  yet  in  1898,  after  a  lapse  of  only 
five  years,  these  two  nations  are  at  war,  and  the  big  guns 
that  then  were  but  instruments  of  courtesy,  and  thundered 
only  in  friendly  salutations,  now  are  become  engines  of 
death,  and  belch  forth  missiles  carrying  destruction  to 
American  and  Spanish  ships. 

For  years  the  nations  of  Europe  have  been  making  the 
seas  populous  with  their  floating  leviathans  of  war,  while 
they  have  made  the  land  resonant  with  the  roll  of  drum, 
blast  of  trumpet,  and  tread  of  marching  armies.  Their  ever 
watchful  sentinels  have  been  for  years  standing  guard  with 
bayonets  crossed  o'er  national  boundaries,  while  their 
mobilized  fleets  have  given  constant  warning  to  neighboring 
thrones.  "At  every  bastioned  frontier,  every  State, 
Suspicion,  sworded,  standing  by  the  gate." 

During  these  years  all  our  ways  have  been  ways  of 
pleasantness,  and  all  our  paths  have  been  paths  of  peace, 
and  this  Republic  has  gazed  with  wonder,  unmixed  with 
alarm,  at  these  mighty  armaments,  while  its  people's 
shoulders,  unbent  by  military  burdens,  have  stooped  only 
in  thriftful  toil,  and  wealth  has  filled  their  coffers  that 
needed  no  soldier  guard. 

During  this  time  the  United  States  has  maintained  an 
army  and  built  a  navy  in  no  way  commensurate  with  its 
resources,  and,  as  we  now  discover,  insufficient  for  its  needs, 
apparently  oblivious  of  the  need  of  either. 


[73 

Therefore  today  in  this  land,  to  which  war  seemed 
most  remote,  the  call  to  arms  rang  out  with  all  the  sudden- 
ness of  an  alarm  of  fire  at  midnight,  and  we  can  hardly 
realize  that  from  counting  room  and  college  hall  and 
scholar's  desk  and  workman's  bench  our  citizens  have 
rushed  to  enlist  beneath  the  stars  and  stripes  to  fight  a 
foreign  foe  upon  foreign  soil,  and  that  the  flag  flying  from 
nearly  every  housetop  means  war  and  not  a  holiday. 

For  the  first  time  the  army  and  navy  of  the  United 
States  leave  this  continent  to  invade  a  foreign  land.  Never 
shall  I  forget  the  day  when  the  California  and  other  regi- 
ments embarked  for  Manila.  There  was  cheering,  singing, 
booming  of  guns,  and  waving  of  flags,  and  there  were 
mothers  and  wives  whose  hearts  were  heavy  and  whose  eyes 
were  lustreless  with  tears  that  would  flow.  Never  shall  I 
forget  the  succeeding  day  when  those  three  ships  in  stately 
procession  steamed  along  the  city  front  and  out  through  the 
Golden  Gate  towards  the  Orient.  The  flags  dipped  a  part- 
ing salute,  from  a  thousand  housetops  good-byes  were 
wafted  to  those  departing  heroes,  from  loving  lips  went  the 
sad  adieu,  "  Good  luck  to  those  who  see  the  end,  good  bye 
to  those  who  fall."  Why  were  these  sons  and  fathers  and 
brothers  and  lovers  leaving  home  in  this  martial  array?  For 
territorial  conquest?  No!  For  this  nearly  all  the  other 
nations  are  now  battling,  or  on  the  eve  thereof.  England  is 
fighting  a  pathway  for  civilization  up  the  Nile,  and  leaving 
opportunities  for  English  colonization  in  the  wake  of  her 
victorious  armies.  France  and  England  are  almost  locking 
horns  in  their  scramble  for  territory  in  Western  and  Central 
Africa.  Germany  and  England  are  both  ambitious  for 
aggrandizement  in  Southern  Africa.     Russia,  Germany  and 


[8] 

England  are  jealously  watching  one  another  in  their  prelim- 
inary steps  for  parcelling  out  China.  But  the  United  States 
has  hitherto  refrained  from  acquiring  territory  beyond  this 
continent,  and  has  pledged  itself  not  to  appropriate  Cuba  by 
means  of  this  war.  Should  other  Spanish  possessions  be 
taken  by  us,  as  some  have  been,  it  will  be  as  an  incident  of 
the  war,  not  as  its  cause  or  inspiration. 

Do  we  seek  more  power  ?  No  !  Of  what  benefit  would 
more  power  be  to  us,  holding,  as  we  do,  that  government 
exists  not  for  its  own  aggrandizement,  but  only  for  the 
benefit  of  the  individual  citizen,  who  wants  not  power,  but 
liberty,  happiness  and  competence. 

Then  why  have  we  gone  into  a  war  that  must  cost  us 
millions  in  money  and  the  lives  of  many  of  our  brave 
soldiers  and  seamen  ? 

Possibly  it  might  be  answered  that  Cuba  has  been  a 
nuisance,  that  we  will  no  longer  have  a  nuisance  next  door, 
and  that  we  have  determined  to  abate  this  nuisance.  But 
such  was  not,  though  it  could  have  been  our  motive. 

We  have  taken  upon  our  shoulders  the  burden  of 
battle,  we  have  assumed  the  cost  of  carnage,  we  are  pre- 
pared to  wear  crape  for  our  kindred  killed,  because  we 
have  determined  to  wage  war  for  humanity's  sake  alone, 
because  in  the  name  of  humanity,  in  the  name  of  civiliza- 
tion we  have  ordered  Spain  to  leave  Cuba. 

We  have  entered  into  a  war  out  of  which  we  could 
expect  that  there  should  come  to  us  only  the  sufferings  of 
those  who  fall  in  battle,  and  the  grief  of  loved  ones  at  home, 
only  sacrifices  and  burdens,  and  the  satisfaction  of  having 
ended  misery  and  misrule  in  a  neighboring  land,  and  of 
duty  done  and  protection  to  the  weak  maintained.     We  are 


[9] 

fighting  to  carry  out  the  principle  upon  which  this  Govern- 
ment was  founded,  namely,  the  uplifting  of  the  weak,  and 
the  resisting  of  the  strong.  Never  before  since  the  crusades 
has  a  nation  embarked  in  such  an  unselfish  adventure. 

We  have  heretofore  been  engaged  in  several  wars.  We 
have  fought  for  our  own  liberty  and  independence;  to 
maintain  the  sacredness  of  our  flag  upon  the  seas ;  to  add 
Texas  and  California  to  our  national  domain ;  and  to  pre- 
serve this  Union.  But  this  war  is  not  for  ourselves,  but 
only  for  the  right  of  others  to  live,  and  like  ourselves  to 
be  free. 

Ex-President  Harrison  recently  said,  "  Our  foes  now  are 
not,  thank  God,  those  of  our  own  household.  That  was  a 
war  for  the  life  of  the  Union,  this  is  a  war  for  humanity. 
That  for  ourselves ;  this  for  the  oppressed  of  another  race. 
We  could  not  escape  this  conflict.  Spanish  rule  had  become 
effete.  We  dare  uot  say  that  we  have  God's  commission  to 
deliver  the  oppressed  the  world  around.  To  the  distant 
Armenians  we  could  only  send  the  succor  of  a  faith  that 
overcomes  death  and  the  alleviations  which  the  nurse  and 
the  commissary  can  give. 

"  But  the  oppressed  Cubans  and  their  starving  women 
and  children  are  knocking  at  our  doors ;  their  cries  pene- 
trate our  slumbers.  They  are  closely  within  what  we  have 
defined  to  be  the  sphere  of  American  influence.  We  have 
said,  "  To  us,  not  to  Europe,"  and  we  cannot  shirk  the  re- 
sponsibility and  the  danger  of  this  old  and  settled  American 
policy.  We  have  as  a  nation  toward  Cuba  the  same  high 
commission  which  every  brave-hearted  man  has  to  strike 
down  the  ruffian  who  in  his  presence  beats  a  woman  or 
child  and  will  not  desist.  For  what  if  not  for  this  does 
God  make  a  man  or  a  nation  strong  ?  " 


[IO] 

"The  mission  of  this  country",  says  Richard  Olney, 
lately  Secretary  of  State,  "if  it  has  a  mission,  as  I  verily 
believe  it  has,  is  not  merely  to  pose  but  to  act  —  and,  while 
always  governing  itself  by  the  rules  of  prudence  and  com- 
mon sense,  and  making  its  own  special  interests  the  first 
and  paramount  objects  of  its  care,  to  forego  no  fitting  op- 
portunity to  further  the  progress  of  civilization  practically 
as  well  as  theoretically,  by  timely  deeds,  as  well  as  by  elo- 
quent words.  There  is  such  a  thing  for  a  nation  as  a 
'splendid  isolation',  as  when  for  a  worthy  cause,  for  its 
own  independence  or  dignity  or  vital  interests  it  unshrink- 
ingly opposes  itself  to  a  hostile  world.  But  isolation  that 
is  nothing  but  a  shirking  of  the  responsibilities  of  high 
place  and  great  power  is  simply  ignominious.  • ' 

Before  the  first  gun  was  fired  many  of  us  were  irreso- 
lute and  full  of  doubt  as  to  the  necessity  or  justice  of  the 
war.  As  a  nation  we  are  said  to  be  very  irresolute  and 
very  full  of  doubt  up  to  the  point  when  we  wake  the 
"  drumming  guns  that  have  no  doubt",  after  which  there 
is  no  more  irresolution  till  the  last  shot  is  fired.  But,  as 
there  were  some  who  continued  to  denounce  President 
Cleveland  long  after  even  the  British  Prime  Minister  had 
admitted  that  this  government  in  the  Venezuela  matter  was 
acting  within  its  right  and  according  to  its  traditions,  so 
there  are  some  of  us  who  still  challenge  the  necessity  of 
this  war.  Fortunately  those  who  so  think  are  in  the 
minority,  and  probably  have  no  flags  as  yet  flying  over 
their  homes  and  offices.  Such  a  patriot,  whose  heart  is  not 
in  the  struggle,  would  never  have  made  the  name  of  Dewey 
rival  that  of  Nelson  in  immortality. 

I  wish  your  patriotism  and  mine  to  be  able  to  hold  up 
its  head  and  challenge  the  justification  of  mankind  for  its 


[II] 

zeal  in  this  fight.  Thrice  is  he  armed  who  knows  his  cause 
is  just. 

Cuba  was  discovered  in  1492  by  Columbus  on  his  first 
voyage,  and  was  almost  immediately  colonized  by  the 
Spaniards  in  their  peculiar  manner,  to-wit,  by  exterm- 
inating the  natives,  causing  a  native  Chief  to  exclaim  to 
the  missionaries  of  the  Cross,  ' '  If  there  are  Spaniards  in 
heaven,  I  prefer  to  go  to  hell."  After  four  hundred  years 
of  Spanish  rule  Cuba,  aptly  named  the  ' '  Gem  of  the 
Antilles,"  the  paradise  of  the  Tropics,  fertile  in  soil  beyond 
all  compare,  rich  in  all  mineral  wealth,  and  capable  of  great 
commercial  development,  is  to-day  a  political,  agricultural, 
commercial  and  financial  wreck,  whose  most  active  business 
and  trade  is  that  of  grave-digging,  and  where  there  is 
neither  "  peace  nor  war,  but  desolation  and  distress,  misery 
and  starvation."  I^ess  in  area  than  the  State  of  New  York 
and  with  a  smaller  population  than  the  City  of  New  York, 
it  pays  its  Governor-General  a  salary  as  large  as  that  re- 
ceived by  the  President  of  the  United  States,  and  is  bur- 
dened with  a  debt  of  $300,000,000.00  incurred  by  its  alien 
rulers  mostly  to  feed  fat  a  host  of  foreign  officials,  and  in 
crushing  the  liberties  of  its  people. 

Since  1777  the  supreme  power  in  this  island  has  been 
bestowed  upon  a  Governor-General,  who  has  been  invested 
with  the  absolute  power  of  the  commandant  of  a  city  during 
the  time  of  siege. 

Since  that  time,  office,  power,  patronage,  distinction 
and  rank  in  their  native  land  have  been  denied  to  all 
Cubans,  and  since  that  time  race  hatred,  "a  mountain  of 
hate  and  a  sea  of  blood,"  between  the  Blacks  and  the 
Creoles  on  the  one  side  and  the  Spaniards  on  the  other  has 


[12] 

been  the  cause  of  Cuba's  troubles,  whereby  this  poor  land 
once  called  "the  ever  faithful  Isle,"  has  been  torn  and  rent 
asunder  until  to-day  it  is  a  shamble  and  a  pest-house. 

One  insurrection  has  followed  close  upon  another,  the 
cry  of  Liberty  bursting  from  the  dying  lips  of  a  captured 
rebel  leader,   being  instantly  caught  up  by  some  successor. 

There  was  an  insurrection  in  1829,  another  in  1848, 
lasting  three  years,  another  in  1855,  another  in  1868  lasting 
ten  years,  and  another  in  1895  now  wagmg« 

During  all  this  period  Spain  has  been  not  only  a  poor 
mother  to  Cuba  but  a  bad  neighbor  to  us. 

The  Cuban  question  is  not  a  new  one  to  us.  For  a 
century  it  has  with  varying  intensity  demanded  our  consid- 
eration. From  Jefferson  to  Buchanan  eight  of  our  Presi- 
dents have  advocated  the  annexation  of  Cuba.  In  1809 
Jefferson  prophesied  its  annexation,  and  in  1823  John  Quincy 
Adams  repeated  this  prophecy.  From  time  to  time  we  have 
apprehended  its  acquisition  by  some  other  European  Power, 
and  we  have  repeatedly  announced  that  we  would  not  allow 
this  island  to  pass  from  Spain  to  any  other  Power. 

The  probability  that  the  Holy  Alliance  and  King 
Ferdinand  might  make  Cuba  the  base  of  operation  against 
these  revolted  South  American  provinces  led  to  the  message 
of  President  Monroe,  in  1823,  which  was  the  official 
announcement  of  what  is  known  as  the  Monroe  Doctrine, 
to-wit,  that  we  will  not  allow  the  acquisition  by  force  of 
any  part  of  this  continent  ( including  Cuba  )  by  any  Euro- 
pean Government. 

In  1825,  when  the  South  American  countries  had 
revolted,  and  Spain  was  endeavoring  to  drown  the  cause  of 
freedom  and  the  hatred  of  oppression  in  the  blood  of  the 


[13] 

oppressed,  Henry  Clay  said,  "If  war  should  continue 
"between  Spain  and  the  new  Republics,  and  Cuba  should 
11  become  the  object  and  the  theatre  of  it,  its  fortunes  have 
"such  a  connection  with  these  United  States  that  they 
"could  not  be  indifferent  spectators,  and  the  possible 
"  contingencies  of  such  a  protracted  war  might  bring  upon 
"the  Government  of  the  United  States  duties  and  obliga- 
"tions  the  performance  of  which,  however  painful,  they 
"  might  not  be  at  liberty  to  decline." 

In  1825  John  Quincy  Adams  suggested  to  Spain  an 
indirect  purchase  of  Cuba  by  the  United  States.  In  1848 
President  Buchanan  revived  this  idea  of  purchase  and  in 
1853  President  Pierce  renewed  it. 

la  1854  the  United  States  Ministers  to  England,  France 
and  Spain  jointly  protested  to  the  Powers  of  Europe  that  the 
possesion  of  Cuba  by  a  foreign  country  was  a  menace  to  the 
peace  of  the  United  States,  and  proposed  that  Spain  should 
be  offered  tho  alternative  of  taking  two  hundred  millions  of 
dollars  for  her  sovereignty  over  Cuba,  or  have  it  taken 
from  her  by  force. 

In  1869  Secretary  Fish  protested  against  Valmaceda's 
brutal  warfare  against  the  Cubans,  and  added  that  this 
government  could  not  admit  the  indefinite  protraction  of 
such  barbarities. 

President  Grant  during  the  insurrection  of  1868  to  1878 
in  vain  offered  his  mediation  for  the  purpose  of  effecting  the 
peaceful  separation  of  Cuba  from  Spain,  and  in  1875  inti- 
mated that  the  United  States  might  have  to  intervene  in 
order  to  stop  the  loss  and  misery  in  Cuba. 

In  1873  we  came  to  the  verge  of  war  over  the  execu- 
tion by  the  Spanish  officials  of  the  captain  and  fifty-three 


[14] 

of  the  crew  of  the  Virginius,  an  American  steamer,  loaded 
with  supplies  and  ammunition  for  the  Insurgents. 

In  1896  President  Cleveland  said: 

"The  spectacle  of  the  utter  ruin  of  an  adjoining  coun- 
try, by  nature  one  of  the  most  fertile  and  charming  on  the 
whole  globe,  would  engage  the  serious  attention  of  the 
United  States  in  any  circumstances.  It  should  be  added 
that  it  cannot  be  reasonably  assumed  that  the  hitherto  ex- 
pectant attitude  of  the  United  States  will  be  indefinitely 
maintained.  *  *  *  "By  the  course  of  events 
we  may  be  drawn  into  such  an  unusual  and  unprecedented 
condition  as  will  fix  a  limit  to  our  patient  waiting  for  Spain 
to  end  the  contest.  When  the  inability  of  Spain  to  deal 
successfully  with  the  insurgents  has  become  manifest,  and 
it  is  demonstrated  that  her  sovereignty  is  extinct  in  Cuba 
for  all  purposes  of  its  rightful  existence,  and  when  a  hope- 
less struggle  for  its  re-establishment  has  degenerated  into  a 
strife  which  means  nothing  more  than  the  useless  sacrifice 
of  human  life  and  the  utter  destruction  of  the  very  subject 
matter  of  the  conflict,  a  situation  will  be  presented  in  which 
our  obligations  to  the  sovereignty  of  Spain  will  be  super- 
seded by  higher  obligations  which  we  can  hardly  hesitate  to 
recognize  and  discharge." 

President  Cleveland  offered  mediation,  and  Spain  re- 
plied that  there  was  no  effectual  way  to  pacify  Cuba  unless 
it  should  begin  with  the  actual  submission  of  the  insurgents 
to  the  mother  country.  Too  well  had  a  century's  experi- 
ence of  cruelty,  oppression,  extortion,  bad  faith,  and  tyrany 
the  most  crushing  taught  the  Cubans  what  submission  to 
such  a  mother  meant,  too  well  did  they  know  that  there 
was  poison  on  such  a  mother's  lips,  and  that  her  embrace 


[15] 

was  death.  There  was  consequently  no  submission,  in 
pacification,  but,  instead,  the  driving  of  400,000  people,  the 
women  and  children,  the  old  and  helpless,  the  sick  and  in- 
firm, all  who  would  not  or  could  not  fight  under  either 
banner,  into  vile  pens  to  starve  and  die,  and  the  laying 
waste  of  the  homes  they  had  occupied,  until  the  dead  by 
the  hundred  thousands  filled  these  shambles,  putrifying 
proofs  of  Spanish  honor,  Spanish  pride,  Spanish  cruelty, 
and  Spanish  incompetency  to  govern  Cuba.  Weylerism 
added  new  terrors  to  inhumanity. 

You  know  what  President  McKinley  has  said  of  this 
policy  of  devastation  and  concentration. 

"  It  has  utterly  failed  as  a  war  measure.  It  was  not 
civilized  warfare.  It  was  extermination.  Against  this 
abuse  of  the  rights  of  war  I  have  felt  constrained  on  re- 
peated occasions  to  enter  the  firm  and  earnest  protest  of  this 
Government. 

"  The  long  trial  has  proved  that  the  object  for  which 
Spain  has  waged  the  war  cannot  be  attained.  The  fire  of 
insurrection  may  flame  or  may  smolder  with  varying  sea- 
sons, but  it  has  not  been  and  it  is  plain  that  it  cannot  be 
extinguished  by  present  methods.  The  only  hope  of  relief 
and  repose  from  a  condition  which  cannot  longer  be  endured 
is  the  enforced  pacification  of  Cuba.  In  the  name  of 
humanity,  in  the  name  of  civilization,  in  behalf  of  en- 
dangered American  interests  which  give  us  the  right  and 
the  duty  to  speak  and  to  act,  the  war  in  Cuba  must  stop." 

Then  came  the  blowing  up  of  the  Maine,  and  the  kill- 
ing of  two  hundred  and  fifty-six  American  seamen  in 
Havana  Harbor,  and  Spain's  practical  response,  "What  are 
you  going  to  do  about  it?"     Then   war  was  declared  be- 


[i6] 

cause  it  was  unavoidable,   peace  and  war  being  not  always 
of  our  own  chosing. 

This  Government  of  the  people,  by  the  people,  and  for 
the  people  could  no  longer  sit  idly  by  and  see  a  neighboring 
people  destroyed  by  a  Tyrant  because  forsooth  his  sover- 
eignty was  imperilled  by  their  struggle  to  be  free. 

This  Christian,  humane,  civilized  people  could  no 
longer  listen  to  the  sounds  of  suffering  that  every  wind 
brought  from  Cuba,  and  could  no  longer  witness  scenes  of 
cruelty  surpassing  the  Inquisition,  and  not  lift  a  hand  to 
help,  because  forsooth  a  Tyrant's  honor  would  be  thereby 
offended. 

This  Government,  which  had  spent  two  millions  in 
trying  to  stop  filibustering,  could  no  longer  expend  its 
revenues  in  helping  Spain  to  continue  its  tyranny  and 
cruelty ;  it  could  no  longer  have  the  administration  of  its 
internal  affairs  disturbed  by  this  constant  obtrusion  of  a 
question  that  Spain  could  not  settle  and  which  the  con- 
science of  our  people  demanded  should  be  settled. 

This  Government  and  this  people  could  not  forget  or 
forgive  the  treachery  or  the  criminal  incompetence  that 
destroyed  the  Maine. 

We  had  in  vain  tried  diplomacy.  We  had  long  listened 
to  the  promises  that  the  Spaniards  knew  they  could  not 
keep,  to  proposals  of  reform  that  they  knew  they  did  not 
intend  to  grant.  '  '  We  were  dealing  vrith  a  Power  whose 
methods  have  discredited  her  in  the  realms  of  truth  and 
justice,  a  Power  which  has  never  lifted  its  heel  from  the 
neck  of  a  subjugated  people  until  compelled  by  force,"  a 
Power  that  could  not  treat  the  insurgent  Cubans  with 
humanity  because  it  could  not  understand  humanity  towards 
an  insurgent. 


[17] 

Therefore  we  are  at  war  with  Spain,  and  we  propose  to 
teach  her  by  the  lesson  of  shot  and  shell  that  American  gun- 
ners backed  by  the  impulse  of  freedom  to  enslaved  and  suffer- 
ing humanity  are  invincible,  that  a  new  day  has  dawned  for 
Cuba,  and  its  Sun  is  the  torch  that  liberty  holds  to  light 
the  world,  a  torch  whose  flame  it  is  our  sacred  duty  to  keep 
burning. 

Over  the  victims  of  Spanish  misrule  floats  the  Buzzard, 
and  the  Eagle  has  winged  its  flight  to  drive  this  vulture 
from  the  Antilles. 

For  centuries  Spain  commanded  the  attention  of  the 
civilized  world,  and  the  tribute  of  many  nations.  Her 
armies  spread  her  power  by  land,  and  by  sea  her  vessels 
carried  her  flag  to  many  distant  climes.  By  conquest  and 
discovery  she  rivaled  ancient  Rome  in  greatness.  In  the 
1 6th  century  Philip  the  Second  had  upon  the  continent  of 
Europe  no  antagonist  worthy  of  his  steel.  His  army  was 
the  largest  and  best  disciplined  in  the  world,  his  fleet  were 
more  numerous  than  that  of  any  other  Power.  Upon  his 
brow  he  could  place  the  royal  crowns  of  Spain,  Portugal, 
Naples  and  Sicily,  and  the  ducal  coronets  of  Milan  and  the 
Netherlands.  In  Africa  and  in  Asia  his  domain  extended, 
while  in  America  he  was  head  of  an  empire  Caesar  would 
have  envied.  Since  the  downfall  of  the  Roman  empire  no 
such  preponderating  Power  had  existed  in  the  world.   Bancroft  Library 

To-day  she  again  attracts  the  attention  of  the  civilized 
world,  but  this  time  by  her  dying  groans  rather  than  her 
shouts  of  victory,  by  the  smoke  of  the  smouldering  ashes 
of  her  grandeur  rather  than  the  glare  of  the  camp-fires  of 
her  conquering  armies,  by  the  cries  of  the  helpless  victims 
of  her  cruelty  and  intolerance  rather  than  by  the  hallelujahs 
of  a  free  and  prosperous  people. 


[18] 

For  centuries  possessing  ports  in  many  lands,  colonies 
in  every  clime,  and  subject  islands  in  many  seas,  to-day,  at 
the  close  of  this  century,  from  her  crown  drop  all  her  ocean 
jewels,  and  neither  Bast  nor  Western  Ind  will  longer  do 
her  obeisance. 

In  the  1 6th  century,  when  Boabdil,  the  last  of  the 
Moors,  pausing  in  his  retreat  before  the  victorious 
Spaniards,  looked  down  from  an  eminence,  since  called  the 
Hill  of  Tears,  for  a  last  glimpse  of  the  beautiful  Alhambra, 
and  wept,  his  royal  mother  reproached  him  for  bewailing  as 
a  woman  the  kingdom  he  had  not  defended  as  a  man.  At 
the  close  of  this  century,  as  the  last  Spanish  sovereign  to 
rule  over  any  part  of  this  Western  World  weeps  that  the 
gem  of  the  Antilles  will  never  again  glisten  in  the  Spanish 
crown,  and  that  the  Spanish  flag  will  no  longer  wave  over 
the  islands  of  the  Eastern  or  Western  sea,  well  may  her 
royal  son  reproach  her  for  bewailing  as  his  mother  the  lands 
she  had  not  protected  as  a  Queen,  well  may  the  Angel  of 
Mercy  reproach  her  for  bewailing  in  her  Spanish  pride  the 
million  of  subjects  to  whom  her  Government  had  been 
merciless. 

The  last  Moorish  sovereign  looked  back  upon  a  land 
where  his  ancestors  had  ruled  with  tolerance,  and  where  the 
Alhambra  remained,  a  monument  of  Moorish  arj:  and  genius 
to  challenge  the  admiration  of  mankind  as  long  as  love  of 
the  beautiful  holds  sway  in  human  souls.  The  last  of  the 
Spanish  sovereigns  to  rule  in  Cuba  looks  back  upon  a  land 
where  she  and  her  predecessors  had  ruled  with  savage  intol- 
erance, and  where  the  Reconcentrado  Barracks  will  remain, 
monuments  of  Spanish  brutality,  at  the  description  of  which 
mankind  will  shudder  as  long  as  one  touch  of  nature  makes 
the  whole  world  kin. 


[19] 

Let  crowned  heads  waste  their  sympathy  upon  this 
royal  mother  and  son  for  the  impending  loss  of  a  throne  that 
does  not  deserve  to  stand.  We,  recalling  the  Moors  whom 
the  occupants  of  this  throne  centuries  ago  massacred,  the 
Jews  whom  they  pitilessly  drove  into  helpless  exile,  the 
Protestant  martyrs  whom  they  burned  at  the  stake,  the 
natives  of  South  America  whom  by  millions  upon  millions, 
by  whole  races  and  nations,  they  remorselessly  extermi- 
nated, and  the  Cubans  whom  the  present  Queen  has  starved 
into  the  submission  that  comes  with  death,  recalling  the 
fact  that  for  every  one  of  the  200,000  soldiers  the  Queen  has 
sent  into  Cuba  one  Cuban  man,  woman  or  child  has  died 
from  starvation,  or  disease  engendered  thereby,  that, 
though  Spain  has  claimed  sovereignty  over  the  Philippines 
for  four  hundred  years,  she  has  conferred  the  blessing  of 
civilization  and  Christianity  upon  only  a  small  part  thereof, 
neglecting  and  abusing  her  stewardship,  we  have  sympathy 
only  for  the  colonists  upon  whom  the  blighting  shadow  of 
this  throne  has  so  long  fallen  so  fatally. 

The  history  of  Spain  has  been  the  history  of  exagger- 
ated pride,  overwhelming  intolerance,  and  extreme  cruelty, 
illuminated  by  the  torch  of  Torquemada,  while  across  it 
like  a  bar  sinister  runs  a  trail  of  blood  from  the  Chambers 
of  the  Inquisition. 

Earth  bears  no  balsam  for  mistakes,  whether  they  are 
committed  by  individuals  or  by  nations,  and  Spain's  mis- 
takes have  left  her  shorn  of  her  rich  colonies,  with  a  bank- 
rupt treasury,  a  ruined  credit,  a  tottering  throne,  an  illiter- 
ate population,  and  anarchy  threatening  her  social  exis- 
tence. In  her  political  philosophy  the  king,  the  noble  was 
everything,  the  people  nothing.  "Her  heavy  throne, 
ringed  by  swords  and  rich  with  titled  show,  is  based  on 


20] 

fettered  misery  below."  She  chose  the  wrong  road,  and 
wrong  choice  has  worked  her  destruction.  The  fate  of  all 
the  empires  that  have  preceded  her  on  this  road  to  national 
decay  awaits  her,     She  is  a  dying  empire. 

"Why  died  the  empires?    I^ike  the  forest  trees 
Did  nature  doom  them?     Or  did  slow  disease 
Assail  their  roots  and  poison  all  their  springs? 
The  old  time  story  answers;  nobles,  kings 
Have  made  and  been  the  State,  their  names  alone 
Its  history  holds ;  its  wealth,  its  wars  their  own : 
Their  wanton  will  could  raise,  enrich,  condemn. 
The  toiling  millions  lived  and  died  for  them." 

For  Spain  the  handwriting  is  on  the  wall.  Her  doom 
is  sealed.  It  was  long  ago  written  in  prophetic  ink  on 
Sybilline  leaves  that  we  would  be  God's  chosen  messengers 
of  his  vengeance  upon  her  for  her  sins.  "  A  hideous  skeleton 
among  living  nations,  a  warning  spectacle  to  the  world,  if 
her  punishment  had  not  overtaken  her,  men  would  have 
said,  "  there  is  no  retribution,  there  is  no  God." 

I  have  stated  that  we  have  entered  upon  this  war  solely 
to  put  a  stop  to  man's  inhumanity  to  man  in  the  Island  of 
Cuba,  expressly  disavowing  any  design  of  territorial  acqui- 
sition as  to  this  Island.  Other  things  may  have  whetted 
our  zeal,  but  they  would  not  alone  have  caused  war.  But 
now  that  war  has  developed,  destiny,  that  shapes  our  ends, 
hew  them  as  we  will,  has  opened  her  Pandora's  box,  and 
out  has  rushed  a  score  of  causative  events  that  are  leading 
and  driving  us  into  the  international  world,  into  the  com- 
pany of  the  nations,  where  that  nation  will  win  that  has  the 
power,  and  that  one  will  hold  that  can.  From  a  potential 
we  must  now  become  an  actual  Great  Power,  and  upon  the 
camera  of  the  future  we  must  cast  one  of  the  largest 
shadows  or  none  at  all. 


[21] 

Destiny  works  in  a  mysterious  way  its  wonders  to  per- 
form, and  rarely  reveals  in  advance  what  is  forging  in  the 
workshop  of  fate.  Behind  the  curtain  of  the  future  to-mor- 
row waits,  holding  in  its  hands  the  unexpected  and  the  in- 
evitable, towards  which  the  unerring  and  irresistible  magnet 
of  Fate  hurries  the  nations. 

Yesterday  we  were  hedged  in  by  the  Chinese  wall  of 
American  isolation,  and  deaf,  blind  and  heedless  of  the 
world  without,  we  neither  accepted  the  responsibilities  of 
our  true  place  among  the  nations  nor  secured  its  advant- 
ages. Vesterday's  to-morrow  finds  that  wall  razed  by  the 
magic  battering  ram  of  destiny,  and  o'er  its  ruins  marched 
the  Phillipine  expeditions.  No  longer  can  our  ship  of 
State  keep  within  sight  of  the  shores  of  an  inland  lake,  but 
henceforth  it  must  navigate  the  open  sea.  Upon  this  sea 
there  are  other  ships,  some  large  and  powerful,  others  weak 
and  small.  With  some  of  them  we  must  in  time  come  in 
conflict,  with  others  we  must  sail  in  friendly  companion- 
ship. If  coming  events  have  cast  their  shadows  before, 
and  the  friendly  and  unfriendly  utterances  concerning  us 
that  are  heard  today  in  Europe  are  prophetic  of  future  in- 
ternational relations,  there  is  a  certain  mighty  ship  of  State 
with  which  ours  must  eventually  combine  into  an  Armada 
that  shall  rule  the  seas. 

If  all  this  be  not  merely  fancy,  and  the  time  shall  come 
when  with  colonial  possessions  beyond  the  seas,  with  our 
Atlantic  and  Pacific  Coasts  tied  more  closely  together  by 
the  Nicaragua  Canal,  and  with  our  flag  floating  over  as 
large  a  navy  as  our  political  and  commercial  interests  re- 
quire, we  are  compelled  to  disregard  Washington's  Fare- 
well Address,  and  to  form  a  foreign  alliance,  then,  as  Mr. 


[22] 

Chamberlain  recently  said  of  the  United  States,  I  say  ot 
England : 

"There  is  a  powerful  and  generous  nation,  using  our 
language,  bred  of  our  race  and  having  interests  indentical 
with  ours.  I  would  go  so  far  as  to  say  that,  terrible  as  war 
may  be,  even  war  itself  would  be  cheaply  purchased  if,  in  a 
great  and  noble  cause,  the  Stars  and  Stripes  and  the  Union 
Jack  should  wave  together  over  an  Anglo-Saxon  alliance. ' ' 

With  the  exception  of  England  none  of  the  European 
nations  give  us  credit  for  our  real  motives  in  this  war.  To 
most  of  them  we  are  an  impertinent,  obtrusive,  bullying, 
menacing,  grasping  people,  not  content  with  all  of  America, 
but  ambitious  of  intruding  into  Europe,  Asia  and  Africa. 
Not  only  have  they  misconstrued  our  motives,  but  they  have 
also  doubted  our  courage  and  skill  in  battle,  thinking  us  simply 
a  nation  of  shopkeepers.  Dewey's  gunning  has  shattered 
this  ill-disguised  contempt  of  us,  it  has  shown  them,  to  use 
the  words  of  a  typical  Yankee,  that  if  we  can  slaughter  our 
pigs  in  peace  we  can  also  slaughter  our  enemies  in  war,  it 
has  proven  that,  though  in  this  land  wealth  has  accumu- 
lated, men  have  not  decayed,  and  that  victory  upon  the 
waves  is  still  the  birthright  of  American  seamen. 

By  England  alone  are  we  entirely  understood,  and  but 
for  her  recent  firm  stand  Austria,  Italy,  France,  Germany 
and  Portugal  would  most  probably  have  attempted  forcibly 
to  stay  our  arms.  This  appreciation  and  friendly  conduct 
have  brought  much  closer  together  these  two  branches  of 
the  Anglo-Saxon  race,  whose  laws  and  institutions  are  in  a 
great  measure  the  same,  who  ' '  of  all  the  Great  Powers  are 
the  only  two  in  whose  national  life  freedom,  in  any  real 
sense,  has  made  her  home",  who  "  are  the  only  two  who 
have  not  by  choice  been  bound  in  the  frightful  chains  of 
that  military  madness  which  has  turned  the  European  con- 
tinent into  a  camp",  who,  "are  both  very  cordially  detested 


I  23] 

and  very  bitterly  envied  by  most  of  the  military  Powers", 
and  of  whom  Jefferson  said  in  1825,  "  These  two  nations 
holding  cordially  together  have  nothing  to  fear  from  the 
United  world.  They  will  be  the  models  for  the  regener- 
ation of  man,  the  source^  from  which  representative  gov- 
ernment is  to  flow  over  the  earth." 

It  was  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  that  shattered  Spain's 
world  spreading  empire,  curbed  the  ambition  of  Philip  the 
Second,  crushed  his  Armada,  and  made  England  mistress  of 
the  seas.  It  was  the  Anglo-Saxon  race,  more  than  the 
snows  of  Russia,  that  vanquished  Napoleon,  prevented  the 
triumph  of  personal  imperialism,  and  stood  guard  at  St. 
Helena  over  the  military  genius  of  all  ages.  It  is  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  race  that  is  ' '  the  pioneer  of  progress  and  the  stub- 
born defender  of  liberty  "  ;  it  is  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  that 
gave  to  mankind  civil  liberty,  whereby  authority  and  law 
are  harnessed  together  to  the  chariot  of  modern  civilization  ; 
and  it  is  this  Anglo-Saxon  race  from  which  we  are  sprung. 
In  our  religious  proclivities,  in  our  system  of  laws,  and  in 
our  literature  we  are  as  Anglo-Saxon  as  the  British,  "  We 
too  are  heirs  of  Rummy mede,  and  Shakespeare's  fame  and 
Cromwell's  deed  are  not  alone  our  mother's."  We  are 
Anglo-Saxon  in  the  men  who  today  are  the  controlling  ele- 
ment in  our  population,  who  lead  and  represent  us, 
and  we  propose  in  the  near  future  that  the  nations  of  the 
earth  shall  respect  our  guns  and  gunners  as  much  as  they 
do  those  of  our  English  cousins,  and  that  we  as  well  as 
England  shall  henceforth  be  recognized  as  much  for  our 
strength  as  for  our  trade. 

In  the  keen  competition  of  the  immediate  future  for  the 
vast  trade  of  the  Orient,  where  the  flower  of  civilization  is 
just  budding,  we  must  be  in  a  position  to  demand  and  exact 


[24] 

our  share,  or  we  will  lose  it.  We  must  match  Port  Arthur, 
Wei-a-Wei,  and  Keao  Chou  with  Manila. 

When  the  Nicaragua  Canal  is  completed,  as  in  the 
near  future  it  must  be,  at  either  end  our  sentinels  must 
stand  guard,  and  our  flag  must  have  a  resting  place  on  some 
of  the  islands  that  command  the  Carribean  Sea,  Gulf  of 
Mexico  and  Atlantic  Ocean. 

Behind  courage  there  must  be  strength.  Behind  great 
national  interests  there  must  be  immediate  and  sufficient 
protection  known  of  all  men.  We  have  courage,  but  behind 
it  little  strength  immediately  available.  We  have  great 
national  interests,  but  it  is  now  known  of  all  men  that  the 
protection  behind  them  is  possible,  but  remote.  Neither  in 
the  Atlantic,  Pacific,  nor  in  the  Orient  have  we  a  spot  where 
an  American  ship  can  coal  as  of  right.  If  we  would  be  as 
independent  as  we  can  be  powerful,  all  this  should  be 
changed. 

The  God  of  Battles  has  planted  our  flag  upon  islands  in 
the  distant  Pacific.  He  will  soon  unfurl  it  upon  islands  in 
the  Atlantic.  A  friendly  people  may  soon  unfold  it  where 
the  waters  break  on  Honolulu's  coral  reefs.  From  now  on, 
wherever  it  is  raised,  except  in  Cuba,  it  is  raised  to  stay, 
and  there  it  will  remain  as  long  as  American  courage  backs 
up  American  genius  upon  the  decks  of  an  American 
man-of-war. 

"Earth  bears  no  balsam  for  mistakes."  "Whoever 
chooses,  must  choose  aright."  God  grant  that  the  Ameri- 
can people  have  chosen  aright,  that  they  have  made  no 
mistake  in  fighting  this  battle  for  humanity,  and  that  its 
effect  upon  our  future  may  redound  to  the  glory  of  our 
country,  and  to  the  dissemination  and  perpetuation  of  popu- 
lar government  throughout  the  world. 


